AAR: Multi-Player After Action Report (Now Discussing Turns up to 13-16)

[Roland Jones]

Originally Posted by LDiCesare

Interestingly, I won one with Helheim and totally disagree with the statement of the Helheim player in this game: "nations that can sit around and research a lot and don't necessarily have to get into an early war( ...) Helheim, on the other hand, is a highly-aggressive nation that wants to expand, expand, and expand some more, crushing everyone in its path". Just like, no. That's the reason why they get 25% forge bonus on their svartalfar in CBM 1.92 by the way. I complained in order to allow them to forge skull mentors, because that's the way Helheim got the best research in game before CBM -provided you boostrapped construction-.

Getting the best research in the game and ruthlessly expanding early on are not mutually exclusive. See Baalz's guide for one way of doing both simultaneously.

[Bluemage142]

Originally Posted by LDiCesare

But they also get an encumbrance penalty, so they tire faster. Which is why the carnute gets reinvig, by the way.

Maenads?

I very carefully didn't discuss EVERYTHING about Marverni- just what I thought would help the reader understand what I'm doing. I was going to bring that up in one of my turn posts, when it became relevant. Same with Shardphoenix's point about the Boar Lord axe.

Didn't know about them being non-cap, though- that'll be useful.

[Shardphoenix]

Couple points about Marverni:
In CBM, Eponi cavalry is actually good - they got light lances, so now they can perform a proper lance charge.
IIRC, Marverni sacreds are NOT cap-only in CBM.
Also, as Caelum is in play, berserk+higher HP may make them actually worth it as a counter to Eagle Kings... And don`t forget, that Boar Lord`s axe now entangles enemy on hit, so these guys are great anti-thugs.

[Shangrila00]

Originally Posted by Shardphoenix

In CBM, Eponi cavalry is actually good - they got light lances, so now they can perform a proper lance charge.

Just checked, they don't. Still, map move 3, fast on the battlefield, and decent stats for their price. I can see them being used as heavy infantry, like LA Mari's Royal Guards, stats not quite so high, but cheaper, and 2 javelin volleys are pretty powerful in the EA.

[jotwebe]

R'yleh

Here's another instalment from everybody's favourite hadopelagic menace. Since my pretender design should be fairly obvious for my ene- fellow players from the graphs, I think I won't loose much discussing it here for the peanut gallery's edification and amusement.

The problem with expanding underwater is that everything has only map move one, so reinforcing is tricky on most maps and impossible on this one. Our starting fortress only has an admin of 30, so starting income isn't great. Expanding on turn two is tricky, and even a party with two extra turns of recruitments will probably run out of steam in a while. Since the water provinces a basically form a huge 1-province ring around a huge landmass, I can only use two parties in parallel, and it's impossible for them to meet up or swing by the capitol to pick up new troops on their way.

As I'm the only water nation (although the goat-faced giants have good amphibian capabilities), I could maybe get away with a very slow expansion. But I don't think I really need a lot of diversity. I could have gotten a bless for my mindblasters -- water would be ok, I guess, and air would be relatively useful with all the air nations around, beside being nice to have for forging and maybe casting perpetual storm. Death or Astral are the other easily cheaply obtainable majors, but they'd be useless. Or I could pay through the nose for some other bless.

However, my ene- fellow players are going to be more experienced, and the world is watching. So I'll take the early power boost rather than be squished after a sluggish and unspectacular expansion. An awake SC it will be. I'm taking the Kraken over the worm because recuperation is great. Together with the fact that it's magicless I won't care when it dies.

But jotwebe, won't you need a lot of priest-power to get it back? Why yes, so it will be useful that I'll be farming polypal mothers to preach my dominion up, which I'll need with everybody else's dominions crowding in on mine. I'll need a high dominion value in addition to that, I think. That gives my kraken awe, and it already comes with fear. Bingo.

That leaves a couple of points for scales. Magic-1 is a no-brainer. In vanilla, so would Order-3, but with CBM order's not all that good anymore. Having taken magic, I like luck to go with it, for the delicious gem events. I could and maybe should take a bit of turmoil with that, but I for some reason I don't. I could also take sloth for points, but production is now plusminus 4% per tick, so not all that negligible. Also, while my national underwater troops mostly don't need resources, I won't be able to recruit those on land. Being able to quickly mass indies at the place they're needed could be useful. I leave the scale at neutral. Same for growth really. Being a water nation makes heat/cold attractive, since it doesn't affect marine provinces. Aesthetically I'd have preferred heat, but all of my mages will be able to cast cold resistance to keep their enc down while only some of them will have access to heat resistance. Additionally, the kraken has some natural cold resistance, so it's better it, too.

I got stuck with some 20-ish "wasted" points, but since dom 9 or 10 and a kraken are non-negotiable, the only changes I could make is swithcing around the scales. That doesn't help with the points. And really, the "waste" is just psychological, I'll just imagine the kraken chassis cost 50 instead 25 points, and it doesn't bother me at all.

[Bluemage142]

Originally Posted by jotwebe

R'yleh

Here's another instalment from everybody's favourite hadopelagic menace. Since my pretender design should be fairly obvious for my ene- fellow players from the graphs

You actually taught me why graph abuse analysis was important with that guy. I saw you take a province first-turn, and thought 'Okay, he's got an awake SC, and he's confident enough to use it on Turn 1... must be a kraken.'

Sounds like I was right.

[jotwebe]

Interesting fact: during playtesting, the first time I tried expanding on turn 1, the kraken died. Only time that happened though.

[Shardphoenix]

Just checked, they don't.

My bad.

and 2 javelin volleys are pretty powerful in the EA

Especially when you have national 0-research h3 strength-boosting spell - javelins get both damage and range from strength.

[Warhammer]

Actually, the same bless that helps the druids helps Marverni's Boar Lords. I'm playing them in another game, and if not for some metagame reasons, I would have won the game early in large part due to the Boar Lords.

[Zywack]

First of, I want to say a huge "Thank you!" for creating this game! I absolutely adore reading AARs, and shared is even better. I'll definitively be reading your thread with great interest. If I wasn't in two games already I would have been happy to be a player in this game, but being just a reader isn't all that bad either!

I respect every Pangaea players. In strategy games in general, I tend to prefer quantity over quality so one of the first race I ever played was EA Pangaea (vs AI). With Maenads and carrion beasts (although MA and LA have easier access to the carrion), the amount of free troops is just absolutely mind-blowing... Castle-walls just disapear against those hordes. Problem is, those hordes disapear just as fast as soon as they fight anything that has decent protection. And since they usually go berzerk, you are sure to lose all of them every losing battle. Still, I quickly reached the point where I couldn't actually lose them fast enough: I had to recruit tons of commanders and even summon sleepers (super high leadership and good bow users) for the purpose of bringing hundreds of them to the front each turn, else they'd just eat all the supplies wherever my pans were. It was fun at first, but it quickly turned into a huge headache to manage... Plus, the Carrions creatures comes in a ton of different variety. You got archers, you have tramplers, you have high-speed flankers and you got super-slow infantries. To get the best use out of those, you need to separate them according to their function, but that's a huge pain since you have no ways to decide what type your carrion centaurs/ladies are making in the first place. I know that Pangaea have other fun tricks up their sleeves, but I simply couldn't stomach all the micromanaging of those armies every single turn. So my heart goes to any Pangaea player that has Maenads and Carrions as part of their strategy

Everytime I look at Marverni, I scratch my head and wonder exactly how I would play them... While I'm quite a new player, I can still look at the recruitment screen/research list and have an idea at the basic strategy I'd employ. Marverni is one of the few nations I can't do that. They are surrounded by giants everywhere, endless forest hordes, blessed killing machines with two lives and glamour/sneaking/flying quality armies. Marverni has easy communion potential, mages that simply scream for Rain of Stone spam and plentiful standards but they just don't look up to par to me overall... Not amazing unique spells, map move 1 old age mages for main caster (Although recruit-everywhere is extremely handy), no real standout amazing fighting unit, acceptable but not amazing thugs. I'm really looking foward to see what the Marverni player has in store so I can see what I missed!